BCE (TSE:BCE) Stock Passes Above 200 Day Moving Average - What's Next?

BCE Inc. (TSE:BCE - Get Free Report) NYSE: BCE crossed above its 200-day moving average during trading on Monday . The stock has a 200-day moving average of C$0.00 and traded as high as C$33.85. BCE shares last traded at C$33.78, with a volume of 4,411,591 shares.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have recently weighed in on BCE. Canaccord Genuity Group upped their target price on BCE from C$33.00 to C$33.50 and gave the company a "hold" rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. Royal Bank of Canada dropped their target price on BCE from C$45.00 to C$41.00 and set a "sector perform" rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, December 18th. TD Securities upped their target price on BCE from C$31.00 to C$33.00 and gave the company a "hold" rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. Barclays downgraded BCE from an "equal weight" rating to an "underperform" rating and dropped their target price for the company from C$41.00 to C$30.00 in a report on Thursday, January 30th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. downgraded BCE from a "neutral" rating to an "underweight" rating and dropped their target price for the company from C$35.00 to C$29.00 in a report on Friday, February 7th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and one has given a buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average price target of C$40.42.

BCE Stock Up 2.1 %

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 226.73, a current ratio of 0.62 and a quick ratio of 0.43. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of C$33.60 and a 200-day simple moving average of C$40.42. The stock has a market capitalization of C$30.89 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 114.40, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.67 and a beta of 0.48.

BCE Cuts Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 15th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, January 15th were given a dividend of $0.9975 per share. This represents a $3.99 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 11.70%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 16th. BCE's dividend payout ratio is currently 1,338.57%.

BCE Company Profile

BCE is both a wireless and internet service provider, offering wireless, broadband, television, and landline phone services in Canada. It is one of the big three national wireless carriers, with its roughly 10 million customers constituting about 30% of the market. It is also the ILEC (incumbent local exchange carrierthe legacy telephone provider) throughout much of the eastern half of Canada, including in the most populous Canadian provincesOntario and Quebec.